SPECIAL POEMS by Wilbur Sheron

SHARING THE LOAD

When the wavering sunlight is fading
At the end of the long, long trail,
And there's only a while to linger
Till I pass through the mystic veil;
then the last recollections are bringing
The bygones around me once more,
I'll remember to keep that picture comlete
Of the girls on the hospital floor.

I'll remember each word kindly spoken,
Each service, or favor, well done,
That smile, reassauring like sunglow,
Cast off by a glorified sun;
I'll recall all the mirth, and the laughter,
And the day-dream each memory bore,
Until, over all, the darkness shall fall,
Then I'll dream of the girls some more.

So, string up the harp, fill the glasses
For a toast to the women in white,
And the kitchen girls who carry the trays,
And the maids for keeping things bright
In Marion Hospital up on the crest
Of the hill by the Wabash Road
Where the hours are long,
but the wilingness strong
To share in the other ones load.

THE WATCHMEN OF DOVER

The somber shade of Britain's foggy midnight
Hung all-embracing o'er the Dover wall,
While down below the murky waters thundered
As Channel waves rolled in to break and fall,
When, through the mist, appeared three motley soldiers
All battle-scared, yet daring in their stride.
"Advance," the sentry ordered, "Give the password"!
"There'll always be and England," each replied.

"I stood here once upon these Cliffs of Dover
To watch Napoleon's move", one soldier spoke.
"And I was here to see", another added,
"That we would never wear the kaiser's yoke."
"I, too, was lookout here" the third made quick rejoinder,
"When Philip's Grand Armada sailed the main.
We are the soul of Britain through the ages.
When Britain fights we rise to serve again."

"We haven't done so well", the sentry faltered.
"We lost at Singapor, and Burma, too.
but we're the men whose fathers fought at Blenheim,
And stayed they tyrant's march at Waterloo.
What though the Union Jack went down at Dunkirk?
We'll not capitulate to doubts and fears.
'There'll always be an England' is our watchword
To-day, as in the wars of other years."

For a thousand years upon the Cliffs of Dover
Where the signal fires of Freedom ever glow,
And the watchmen stand to look across the channel,
Daring men have seen the foeman come and go;
And when the proud invador brings destruction, ----
When desolation hovers, --- death appears,
Then the yeoman of Britain meets the challenge
Even though they pay with sweat, and blood and tears.

WAITING

A lovely white lily most graciously smiled
By the side of cottage door;
And a mighty oak, where the sea breaks wild,
Embellished the rockbound shore;
Then, looking afar, I beheld a star
Of the brightest magnitude,
With never a neighbor in million of miles
To molest its solitude.

And they waited through their appointed time,
The lily a season or two;
While the sturdy oak, through storm and shine,
Weathered the centuries through.
And, into the night, the piercing light
Of the star, for an aeon shown;
And they wondered, each, why they had to wait
While the waited there alone.

Often, I fret when I have to wait
On events to take a turn,
Forgetting, it seems, to appreciate
How those who wait may learn;
For while I wait, I know I serve
And end, sometimes concelaed;
But in that end, when all is done,
The purpose stands revealed.

NO MORE LETTERS

I am lonely tonight for that letter
You were going to write me, you said,
And I wonder, the time I am waiting,
On the silence you are giving instead.
I hope that no word I have spoken,---
No favor I forgot to extend
To you in exchange for your kindness,
Has brought me the less of a friend.

As refreshing as roses at dawning,
Were the letters of yours in the old days,
When the letters were many from you;
But just as the blight nips a rose bud,
And its petals no longer unfold,
So must wither the soul of a true friend,
When a friendship most cherished grows cold.

If the last farewells now have been spoken,
And we're strangers who never have met,
A assure you of one thing I'll remember,---
I'll remember to never forget:
I'll forget not the things you have told me.
I'll remember each heartache I've paid.
But the fondest recollection of all shall
Be the pleasure your friendship once made.

THE STARS OF LOUIS BRAILLE

Primeval man, unlearned in Nature's lore,
Thought heaven was an azure wall between
His evil world and holy things unseen.
The stars, no less their strange enigma bore,
Were God's unordained windows or a door
The angles put ajar to spread the sheen
Of vespers hour, that mortal eyes might glean
The splendors of a paradise. But your
Achievenment with six star-like dots is real.
They make an ample casement for the light
Of mental dawn to set the night-bound free,
To send the spirit soaring, and to feel
The surge of hidden Truth stir, in its might,
Imaginings to span infinity.

The following are poems written by Wilbur Sheron in the possession of Virginia Schulze Samaha. There are three that were copyrighted by the New York Times which are not included here.

REBECCA

There's contentment in the evening when the friends we used to know
Linger on awhile to visit, like the shadows come and go;
And I feel a thrill of gladness when a missing one appears
Through the portal, long beclouded with the mist of fading years.

Though they bring a day dream substance to beguile a lonely hour
When the present seems so empty, and devoid of charm or power;
Yet the cares of life are lightest when my musings intertwine
With the days when I was all you dream, and you alone were mine.

I shall always see you sitting in the chair that's vacant now,
With that look of rapt elation, like the time I told you how, --
Just because of all your kindness, and the goodness you possessed,
I would give the name "Rebecca" to the girl I loved the best.

Slender was your form, but graceful as the sweep and surge of dawn;
Blushing red, your cheeks, like roses,
And as fair to look upon;
Noble thoughts, and lofty purpose, made the girl you choose to be,
But the music in the words you spoke endeared you first to me.

When I look upon your picture in the mellow candle light,
I can see the same old luster in your hazel eyes so bright;
And a tender smile is playing on your pretty face aglow,
All encircled with the locks of brown your wore so long ago.

Often, through the years receding, I have watched your smiling face,
When you seemed to leave your picture, and to take another place
On the bench before the organ, there to play and sing for me
From the book of "Old Songs" waiting for your touch upon the key.

Let the harp, with strings a-tremble, all the night with music fill;
Let the silver notes of bugles bring their echo from the hill;
Deftly touch the flute a moment, if you will, but tell me true
Why no melodied enrapture like the songs you used to do.

Fortune never smiled with favor on the things we planned to do.
Social customs, and position, barred the way from me to you.
But we loved, perhaps unwisely, knowing well that from the start
You were on the plane beyond me; and we'd some day have to part.

Many are the years behind us, and the calendar since then,
One by one, has dropped its pages like the broken petals when
Some delightful bloom is shattered; but the years, though fading fast,
Have diminished not, with gayer hours, that memory of the past.

Anchored now are all my dream boats in the harbor of regret,
Never more to feel the breezes on the canvass trim and set;
And where once I dreamed of futures like the bold and daring win;
Now I dream, before the fireplace, of the things that might have been.

Can it be that far out yonder, by some distant star concealed
From this world of disappointment, lies a fair Elysian Field
Where the soul, worn by frustration, may, perhaps, fulfillment find
For the hopes, and dreams, and yearnings, gone astray, or left behind?

TO THE MISSISSINEWA

Beautiful river flowing forever among the hills of Indiana
Unlike the Rhine, the Blue Danube, the Swaunee or Savannah,
Your name, though beautiful to speak, can't fit in rhyming story
And that is why the poets all forgot to sing your glory.

With thoughts akin to reverence, I watch you roll along,
Enraptured by the majesty of all your art and song:
As, with laughter and tears through the fading years,
An inspiration to the heart,----a sermon to the soul.

Though no cathedrals life their spires above your sacred shore;
No castles old, with barons bold, have crept into your lore;
Though no armadas ever roamed your waves in stately splendor;
Yet those who know you best extend a love that's true and tender.

I have watched you reflect the blue of the sky, beautiful river of mine;
And the fleecy clouds that floated by, beautiful river sublime;
The purple and crimsom and gold have I seen when sunset splashed your sivery sheen,
Its colors to blend with the shoreline's green, beautiful river divine.

When Indian Summer embraces the land, and the leaves, no longer green,
Reflect their colors from either bank with a stretch of sky between,
I'll come and stand near a stately tree to linger a moment in reverie,
Then bid you "Good-bye:, for well do I know you'll soom be wrapped in a mantel of snow,
For winter is near. And the winds will blow the leafless branches with empty nest,
Nature no longer will smile, for this is the season when all things rest and you shall sleep awhile.

Oh, beautiful stream, when you sleep do you dream
Of the days when the birch bark canoe so gracefully rode on your heaving breast,
Or quietly passed while you were at rest, some game, or a foe, to pursue?

When you wake in the spring, do you wish it would bring
The forest of long, long, ago; with a deer peeping through
The trees down at you alert for a hunters bow?

Do you long to once more see a chief by the door
Of his lodge, ---with his warriors there; When the battle cries cease
And the smoke of the Peace Pipe drifts on the balmy air?

Alas, fair dreamer, when you'll be waking, 'tis not to find a dream come ture;
The things for which your heart is breaking shall never be returend to you.

The great Miami tribe no more shall dwell upon your winding shore,
Your sylvan grandeur to adore, or chant your praise in song;
They disappeared in one wild day, to White Man's greed they fell a prey,
Their wildwood life was swept away, but you still roll along.

I want to believe that rivers like you have Elysian Fields and Valhalla, too;
So when the boatman comes with his silent oars to carry me over to one of those shores,
I'll fancy the ripples that break on the sand is the spirit of you I have found again;
And again we'll wander by hill and tree together for all Eternity.

REMEMBER?

Remember those trolly rides out to the park
For a concert with Bailey's Brass Band,
Then a six o'clock dinner at the old Oyster Bay,
And a show at the Royal Grand,
Back there when the Blumenthal Store had the styles,
And you posted profits and loss
For the Farmer's Savings and Trust when it stood
Where Fourth Street and Washington cross?

And after the music and feasting were done,
Remember down make-believe lane
How the dome on the Court House, beneath a full moon,
You thought was your Castle in Spain?
And the boy in his boat was a bold buccaneer,
With a touch of excitement to lend,
When his sail caught the breeze of the island that laid
In the swift Mississinewa bend.

You fancied the mill by the dam over north
Was another along Zuider Zee;
And the bluffs by the river were Dover's White Cliff
Ever watching the sea;
The Branson Street bridge was a bridge o'er the Rhine
Leading on the land of Cathay;
And the stroke of the town clock you though was Big Ben
On the banks of the Thames far away.

And so on your carpet of magic you roamed
Every land you could think of or name.
And new shades of loveliness garnished your smile
With each adventure that came:
But when the last journey had come to and end
There were accents entoned with regret
When you said, "Will you always remember?"
And I said, "How can I forget?"

THE DAM

I often come and linger long
In raptured admiration,
To sing my silent song of praise,
And offer my libation,
To our own Mississinewa,
A bit of silver lacing
So neatly wound through Hoosier fields,
With Hoosier hills embracing.

Beside her Frances Slocum lies,
And Indian Chief's are sleeping,
While Conner's Mill, and Somerset,
Their storied past is keeping;
Beside her Campbells Army broke
The great Miami Nation;
And each of these, like beads of pea pearl,
I count in meditation.

For now the engineers have come,
The river days are numbered.
The blueprints they possess to build
The dam are not encumbered
With sentiments of scenic things,
Or old historic glory,
So these must die beneath the flood,
And live alone in story.